TMIT's Guide to Strategy & Tips Series Map Creation

[mcaber]

I have a question. Is it possible to make the player choose civilization (and leader) from a set starting location? I realize that the player will not be able to choose from the civilization already set for the AI´s, but maybe there is a way that the game can automatically derive which ones to choose from?

Maybe you would have to enter all remaining civs (from the ones marked for the AI´s) manually something like this (?):

LeaderType=LEADER_PACAL;LEADER_MANSA_MUSA;LEADER_ISABELLA;LEADER_ZARA_YAQOB ....and so forth

But then what happens with these settings??:
CivDesc=TXT_KEY_CIV_MAYA_DESC
CivShortDesc=TXT_KEY_CIV_MAYA_SHORT_DESC
CivAdjective=TXT_KEY_CIV_MAYA_ADJECTIVE
FlagDecal=Art/Interface/TeamColor/FlagDECAL_Maya.dds
WhiteFlag=0
CivType=CIVILIZATION_MAYA

I fear this might not be possible at all and I am already preparing a rant...

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I have a question. Is it possible to make the player choose civilization (and leader) from a set starting location? I realize that the player will not be able to choose from the civilization already set for the AI´s, but maybe there is a way that the game can automatically derive which ones to choose from?

Maybe you would have to enter all remaining civs (from the ones marked for the AI´s) manually something like this (?):

LeaderType=LEADER_PACAL;LEADER_MANSA_MUSA;LEADER_ISABELLA;LEADER_ZARA_YAQOB ....and so forth

But then what happens with these settings??:
CivDesc=TXT_KEY_CIV_MAYA_DESC
CivShortDesc=TXT_KEY_CIV_MAYA_SHORT_DESC
CivAdjective=TXT_KEY_CIV_MAYA_ADJECTIVE
FlagDecal=Art/Interface/TeamColor/FlagDECAL_Maya.dds
WhiteFlag=0
CivType=CIVILIZATION_MAYA

I fear this might not be possible at all and I am already preparing a rant...

You can play as AI civs after making the WB save, you can switch which civs are on the map, and you can change starting locations. This has been described already though so I'm not sure how to help you here.

 

[mcaber]

You can play as AI civs after making the WB save, you can switch which civs are on the map, and you can change starting locations. This has been described already though so I'm not sure how to help you here.

Yes but as I understand it there is no way to play the same starting location as different civilizations? Meaning, you start up the save and the game lets you pick whichever civilization you´d like, and it automatically puts you in a preset starting location (same start location regardless of the civ you choose). Sorry if I am mistaken here.

 

[dalamb]

The only way to do that is to find StartingX=... lines for two civs in the WBsave and swap them. You have to make sure to delete all the BeginUnit/EndUnit blocks, too.

 

[r_rolo1]

Or you can simply swap the leaders/civs headlines in the player description if you want to keep the units, namely this part:

	LeaderType=LEADER_CHARLEMAGNE
	LeaderName=TXT_KEY_LEADER_CHARLEMAGNE
	CivDesc=TXT_KEY_CIV_HOLY_ROMAN_DESC
	CivShortDesc=TXT_KEY_CIV_HOLY_ROMAN_SHORT_DESC
	CivAdjective=TXT_KEY_CIV_HOLY_ROMAN_ADJECTIVE
	FlagDecal=Art/Interface/TeamColor/FlagDECAL_HolyRomanEmpire.dds
	WhiteFlag=0
	CivType=CIVILIZATION_HOLY_ROMAN
	Color=PLAYERCOLOR_DARK_LEMON
	ArtStyle=ARTSTYLE_EUROPEAN

This will keep the techs and the units ( promos included ) of the old civ though... further care must be taken if you want to change techs as well or to avoid UU in wrong civs ( say, Roman quechuas ).

 

[mcaber]

As I suspected. Thanks for the verification though!

 

[CivilizedTiger]

Hey!

Quick question: if an AI civilization starts with mysticism and fishing, in order for it to receive immortal bonuses, it gets hunting, agriculture and archery, leading to them having 5 techs off-the-bat, as opposed to civs which already have hunting and agriculture, and would only receive archery as a freebie. Is this correct, or does it work differently?

And... another thing: if I add archery to the AI, do I also need to add hunting?

 

[r_rolo1]

Yup, the techs a civ get for the level it is are hardcoded. The human always receive the Wheel as starting tech in Warlord and the AI always receive agri + hunting + archery in Immortal, no matter if they have already those techs or not. It is a PITA, but that is the way the devs defined it.

And , no, you don't need to give them hunting for them to have archery operational. Techs never need their prereqs to work...

 

[CivilizedTiger]

Thank you for the clarifications!

 

[mathepic]

I'd just like to say that you shouldn't use a word processor with WB saves.

Text editors are more lightweight and suited to the job - Its ASCII, not some sort of rich text.

 

[r_rolo1]

True enough. I never used anything fancier than notepad for editing WB files ( besides WB itself, obviously )

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Wordpad/notepad don't have find/replace, though, and there is no reason word, openoffice, or any other comparable text editing software can't handle this stuff.

 

[CivilizedTiger]

You can go with notepad++ if you wish. It has support for regex search and replace, for instance, although I'd imagine that if you know regex, you probably don't need to be tipped on a good text editor.

 

[ifinnem]

I must be a little slow - everyone talks about giving back archery to barbs but how does one actually do this
e.g. I took an IU WB file (XLI SB) and loaded it as a scenario on epic speed and saved it as a new WB file. I still see no references to barbs anywhere in the WB file
Help.....

 

[Ignorant Teacher]

Start the game and, in the first turn, click CTRL+W and select the barbarians in the list of players. Then you go to the Technologies tab and add Archery.

 

[ifinnem]

Start the game and, in the first turn, click CTRL+W and select the barbarians in the list of players. Then you go to the Technologies tab and add Archery.

Sweet thanks

 

[CivilizedTiger]

What are the exact techs that we should give to the AI depending on difficulty?

I used to believe that the bonus techs were these:
Monarch - Archery
Immortal - Hunting Archery
Deity - Hunting Agriculture Archery

Then I played an emperor game which I WBfied and noticed that the above table needed Emperor in stead of Immortal, as Emperor AI already gets hunting and archery as bonus techs

But now I've just seen something which completely puzzles me:
Tech=TECH_FISHING
Tech=TECH_THE_WHEEL
Tech=TECH_AGRICULTURE
Tech=TECH_HUNTING
Tech=TECH_MINING
Tech=TECH_ARCHERY
This is from the same WB file in which the first AI gets The wheel, agriculture, hunting and archery. The thing is, if there are only 3 bonus techs, then, considering a civ starts with 2 techs, no AI should start with 6 techs, and yet that's what I saw in the WB.

So... is anyone less confused than me?

 

[NihilZero]

I have a question that I don't think has come up yet, with relation to Random Leaders.

If you generate a random leaders game, where is the actual leader personality that is used with that leader recorded? For example, I generate a map with random leaders on and one of the civs is Sumeria. It's Gilgamesh's face, obviously, but who's personality is behind the face?

I've looked in the WB file of the recent RPC Mao game, and I can't find it anywhere. For example:

BeginPlayer
Team=2
LeaderType=LEADER_FRANKLIN_ROOSEVELT
LeaderName=TXT_KEY_LEADER_ROOSEVELT

This is puzzling, as with Random personalities, Roosevelt isn't really Roosevelt. So who is he and where is this information saved?

 

[r_rolo1]

I have to generate a random personalities game to confirm that, but the loading of the the XML personality has nothing to do with LeaderName tags, but with LeaderType alone. Not sure of how this covers the LH displayed , though.

 

[NihilZero]

I have to generate a random personalities game to confirm that, but the loading of the the XML personality has nothing to do with LeaderName tags, but with LeaderType alone. Not sure of how this covers the LH displayed , though.

Yep, the name has no actual effect other than just to be the name. But when you change the LeaderType it changes the appearance of the leader and (when not using random personalities) it determines which personality is used. However, as far as I can ascertain, there is nothing in the WB file about what random personality is used...

I suppose this means that if you make a WB save of a random personalities game, each time the game is played a different set of random personalities is generated. Weird. That would mean that everybody who played the RPC Mao game from the WB save had a different set of leaders.

It should be easy enough to verify this, but a bit time consuming as it takes a while to figure out who the leaders might be.